Number News

By E&T news desk

Published Monday, May 21, 2012

Mainline steam locomotive Tornado clocks up 50,000 miles in four years, while new cars in the UK reduce CO2 emissions by almost a quarter since 2000

50,000

The mainline steam locomotive Tornado has clocked up 50,000 miles in service since completion in 2008. Tornado is a regular sight hauling excursion trains and appearing at rail festivals around Britain. It was built in Darlington by the A1 Steam Locomotive Trust to a 1940s design by Arthur H Peppercorn, but with additional water capacity and modern safety features for the 21st Century.

1/5

Twenty per cent of broadband households in Western Europe will have at least one ‘smart home’ product by 2017, according to Strategy Analytics. The most popular will be remote monitoring and control systems like video cameras, motion sensors, thermostats and entertainment systems.

10

Ten startup firms have signed up as tenants of the European Space Agency’s UK Business Incubation Centre within a year of its opening at the Science and Technology Facilities Council’s Harwell campus in Oxfordshire. The companies aim to turn cutting-edge space technologies into non-space businesses, with business and financial support from ESA BIC Harwell and access to ESA and STFC expertise.

10,000

Microsemi Corporation has shipped its 10,000th radiation-tolerant RTAX-S FPGA device for spaceflight applications. The company has also shipped tens of thousands of its previous generation spaceflight FPGAs in the 55 years that it has been developing products for space missions.

£18.3M

Metal-theft crimes affecting train services were down 15 per cent in 2011-12 to 844 incidents from 995 the previous year, according to figures released by Network Rail. Even so, the total direct cost to the industry rose by 12 per cent, from £16.4m to £18.3m, because the thefts have spread to busier and more complex parts of the network, where repairs are more expensive and loss of service causes greater disruption.Rail, power and telecoms businesses are all calling for tougher legislation on scrap-metal dealing, going beyond a ban on cash trading.

23%

UK average new car CO2 emissions have fallen by nearly a quarter (23 per cent) since 2000, and by 4.2 per cent in 2011, according to figures published by the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders. Sub-130g/km cars accounted for almost half the 2011 market (46.8 per cent), with band ‘A’ cars (sub-100g/km) doubling market share to 3.4 per cent in 12 months. Diesel-fuelled cars accounted for a record 50.6 per cent of sales.